I found this Pan Am Airlines promotional photo (ca. 1956) in Christine Yano’s new book on the history of Nisei stewardesses called Airborne Dreams (Duke University Press, 2011). Yano argues that “Japanese American (and later other Asian and Asian American) stewardesses [as they were called in the 1950s
I’ve always loved vintage photos, and I stumbled upon this amazing blog, Of Another Fashion, that has vintage photos of “not-quite-hidden but too often ignored fashion histories of U.S. women of color”, along with personal stories. There’s an interesting and subtle message in the trends of their clothes and updos, and I love looking at this – it always leaves me feeling bittersweet and nostalgic, and like I am gaining a better understanding (or realizing just how much I don’t know!) about history and our past.
This photograph of women curtseying comes from the scrapbook of Althea “Bee” Moore, who was an undergraduate student at the University of Iowa (then known as the State University of Iowa) from 1924 to 1928. The scrapbook’s collection of photographs, clippings, invitations and concert programs reflect Moore’s active social life and wide acquaintance among the African American community of Iowa in the 1920s.
Florence Yamaguchi (left), and Kinu Hirashima, both from Los Angeles, are pictured as they stand under an apple tree at Manzanar internment camp. (Their hairdos are amazing - especially Hirashima’s bangs!)
